How to recognize “looksmaxxers”, these men who will do anything to become more attractive ?

Dents blanches, cheveux soignés, corps athlétique, peau zéro défaut, mâchoire carrée : les hommes adoptent le 'looksmaxxing' pour devenir plus attrayants. PeopleImages/Getty Images

Décryptage d'un phénomène devenu viral, le 'looksmaxxing', qui fait déjà des millions d'adeptes sur les réseaux sociaux.

White teeth, athletic body, impeccable hair, flawless skin, square jaw: younger generations of men no longer skimp on ways to improve their appearance and adopt the codes of ;a standardized, sometimes stereotypical beauty, even resorting to controversial tricks.

According to the Urban Dictionary, the 'looksmaxxing' is none other than "the self-image improvement process commonly used by incels", in other words, involuntarily celibate men. The idea is simple, it involves using all possible means, sometimes even the most dangerous, to improve one's physical appearance in order to appear more attractive in the eyes of others, and especially the fairer sex.

Contrary to what one might think, if the term is gaining popularity, it is far from being new, and would have originated on incel discussion forums and the manosphere before becoming a trend on social networks, as explained by the New York Times. It is now the younger generations who are embracing 'looksmaxxing', and are increasingly contributing to making men into women like any other.

Optimize your beauty routine

We can no longer count the videos published under the hashtag #looksmaxxing which highlight complete and demanding beauty routines intended to embrace a certain ideal of beauty. And if women are usually the first targets of these tutorials, it is men who are targeted here, determined to find all the possible and imaginable tips intended to boost their physical appearance.

Be careful though, make no mistake, the 'looksmaxxing' is not limited to cosmetics, although socionauts suggest the opposite, it is a much broader process, which includes fashion, sport, and even food .

"Last year, I picked up on the things girls did to look more beautiful and told the boys to do the same thing," says Dillon Latham, now followed by more than 1.4 million subscribers on TikTok, at the New York Times. On the young man's account, we discover a myriad of videos intended to advise those who wish to become more attractive – or at least embrace certain beauty criteria.

How to have abs, how to smell good, what clothes to wear or not to wear, how to get rid of acne, how to have attractive features, or even how to have a perfectly symmetrical face matter among the advice given by the socionaut.

From the most basic to the most controversial

A beauty routine that is basically basic and safe, which translates into relatively classic practices and gestures, such as going to the hairdresser, removing hair, whitening your teeth, play sports, adopt an optimal skincare routine, learn facial yoga, or even indulge in 'mewing', a technique which consists of practicing tongue placement rehabilitation exercises to have a square jaw, get rid of your double chin, or make your face more harmonious.

Relatively common practices that we find under the name of 'softmaxxing', and which closely resemble those adopted for many years long time by the… women.

But young men are also now turning to more extreme – and controversial – practices known as 'hardmaxxing'. This time it involves resorting to dangerous, or at least radical, techniques to achieve a physical metamorphosis. This obviously involves cosmetic surgery, notably through the installation of implants, but also through skin whitening, or even through extreme diets.

One of these practices, bone smashing, has recently gone viral. It was then a matter of breaking the bones of his jaw to obtain a squarer one, a sign of virility according to some. A dangerous trend which, contrary to what its virality suggests, is in reality far from gaining a crowd of followers, even among 'looksmaxxers'.

The community of these men in search of a better appearance continues to grow, reflecting a desire to embrace certain norms and injunctions linked to masculinity.

Thing which can partly be explained by the impact that certain social networks can have on self-esteem and self-confidence, but which can also be perceived as the last straw at a time when women are trying to shatter all these stereotypes and injunctions. Just like, no doubt, absolutely wanting to put a name to a banal beauty routine designed by men for men.